Timestamp #306: Flux – Village of the Angels

May 22, 2024July 19, 2024 Michael Falkner4 Comments

The Weeping Angels return to form.

In a basement laboratory circa November 1967, Claire Brown tests a lie detector. Professor Eustacius Jericho is amazed when she claims her birth year is 1985, and she quickly corrects it to 1935. Outside, Reverend Shaw looks for a girl named Peggy with a group of people and a note marked “Leave Now.” The experiment is interrupted when Claire adopts a deep voice and warns about the end of time. When she recovers, she states “The Angel has the TARDIS.”

The time capsule in question is hurtling through the vortex as the Doctor pulls glowing cables from the walls and triggers a dimensional compression wave that reboots the TARDIS and ejects the Angel. As the TARDIS recovers, the travelers decide to investigate their new landing place: The village of Medderton in 1967.

The team meets Gerald and Jean, and Yaz and Dan talk to them while the Doctor follows her sonic screwdriver. The Doctor’s sonic leads her to the basement laboratory and Claire, the source of the sonic’s perturbations. Claire feels ill and retreats to the restroom where she sees Angel wings sprouting from her back. The Doctor finds drawings of an Angel and the TARDIS.

Mrs. Hayward asks Reverend Shaw to count the church’s gravestones. During his count, he is taken by an Angel. Yaz and Dan also encounter an Angel while searching for Peggy.

The Doctor continues her investigation of Jericho’s home, finding broken glass everywhere and a field of Angels surrounding the house. The Doctor and Jericho secure the home while Claire explains that before she met the Doctor in 2021, she started receiving visions. Those visions led to the discovery that the entire population of this village will disappear, repeating similar events from 1901. The group retreats to the basement with a television while the Doctor sets a trap. Claire finds stone dust in her eye.

Yaz and Dan materialize in the village of the past. The place is deserted, but since the Weeping Angels are involved, Yaz and Dan decide to search for Peggy. They find the girl and a warning: The Angels left her behind so long as she didn’t explore beyond the village boundary. Yaz and Dan discover that the entire town is floating in space, something Peggy relates to “quantum extraction.” The village also appears to be shrinking.

In the present day, Gerald and Jean discover that their village is also floating in space. They find an Angel and are transported back in time. Mrs. Hayward then approaches with no consequence.

The Doctor, Claire, and Jericho monitor the Angels using a primitive CCTV. As the Doctor mentions that images of Angels can become Angels, one attempts to emerge from Claire’s sketch. The Doctor defeats it, but soon finds Claire transforming into a Weeping Angel for housing the image in her head. The Doctor decides to make psychic contact with the Weeping Angel in Claire’s mind.

The Doctor finds herself on a blue beach between parted waves. The Angel inside Claire is the same one that hijacked the TARDIS, and it asks for help to escape from others of its kind. The Angels hunting her are searching for a rogue as part of an extraction squad sent by the Division.

In the past, Gerald and Jean find Dan, Yaz, and Peggy. The elderly couple encounter an Angel and are turned to stone after touching it. No being can survive two touches from a Weeping Angel, and the couple shatter into pieces.

In the present, the Angels taunt Jericho with his supposed failings. The rest of the squad moves when one of them affects the television and tries to emerge from it. Jericho smashes the television and the squad breaks into the basement.

Inside the psychic vision, the Doctor questions the rogue Angel about Division. It offers an ultimatum: Stop the squad from obtaining knowledge of Division and the Doctor’s forgotten lives and it will spare Claire and answer the Doctor’s questions. The link is broken when Jericho wakes them up, and the trio is forced to escape through a hidden tunnel. Unfortunately, the walls are covered in Angel arms, and the trio is trapped between two Angels.

In 1901, Peggy tells Yaz and Dan about a Stone Age burial site that suddenly appeared overnight. They find a split in space-time where Peggy sees Mrs. Hayward, the woman who is actually Peggy grown up. The burial site is a collection of Weeping Angels who want a witness to their quantum extraction.

In 1967, the trio struggle with the Angels. Claire escapes, but Jericho is sent into the past. The Doctor continues through the tunnel but is left untouched by the Angels. She emerges from the burial ground next to Claire and sees the rift. The area is surrounded by Angels taking joy from the Doctor’s struggle. The quantum extraction is a process to take the village out of time to capture the rogue Angel. The rouge makes a deal to capture the Doctor, passing a message that she is recalled to Division.

The Doctor slowly transforms into a Weeping Angel, sprouting wings and adopting the typical stance. She turns to stone and joins the rest of the squad.

While all the Angel shenanigans are going on, Bel continues her search for Vinder. She lands on the former resort planet Puzano and is offered safety as a refugee by Namaca Ost Parvess Po. Bel and Namaca join a large crowd searching for safety from the Flux. Azure and a Passenger appear and take the entire crowd away. Bel throws Namaca to the ground, leaving them as the only survivors. Azure tells them to bring others, and Namaca is furious for missing his chance at sanctuary. Namaca later finds Vinder and leads him to a rock wall with a holographic message hidden within. Bel’s coordinates are lost in the message, but Vinder promises to find her.

All of his faults aside, Chris Chibnall (and Maxine Alderton, the only co-writer for the Flux miniseries) succeeded in making the Weeping Angels scary again. After their introduction in Blink and their evolution in The Time of Angels & Flesh and Stone (in which we learn about the image of an Angel becoming an Angel), the villains lost their narrative power as they became bit players and goofy antagonists. Despite the sad game-changing ending, The Angels Take Manhattan (and its Statue of Liberty Angel) is the epitome of the effort to make a monster more menacing by escalation.

This story gets back to basics with a temporal twist. The Weeping Angels stalk the main players as they play a vicious game in a unique twist on their mythology. The story cleverly plays with elements of their background – don’t blink, draining of power, temporal dislocation – while returning them to their horror roots. The Division angle adds to their mystery, as does the Doctor’s peril at the end.

This flow is disrupted by Bel and Vinder’s story, which feels like filler that tries to keep Azure relevant. I’m sure it will mean something in the remaining chapters, but the inclusion here threatened to derail the powerful “A” plot. This was exemplified by the glitchy mid-credit scene that interrupted that spooky rendition of the Doctor Who theme.

Other than that, I found this story to be a treat to watch.

Rating: 5/5 – “Fantastic!”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Flux – Survivors of the Flux

The Timestamps Project is an adventure through the televised universe of Doctor Who, story by story, from the beginning of the franchise. For more reviews like this one, please visit the project’s page at Creative Criticality.

Culture on My Mind – Oregon Trail

May 17, 2024May 13, 2024 Michael FalknerLeave a comment

Culture on My Mind
Oregon Trail
May 17, 2024

This week, thanks to the Gaming Historian, I’m thinking about my early days with computer games.

In the mid-1980s, my school had a room full of Apple II computers. They had chunky keyboards, electric green monitors, and 5-1/4″ floppy disk drives. They’re prehistoric by modern standards, but the Apple II was an important milestone in home computing as one of the first successful mass-produced microcomputers.

Once or twice a week, for about 30 minutes or so, we were taken to the computer lab and allowed to play with whatever programs suited the teacher’s whims. My first experience was with the Logo programming language which drove a sprite called Turtle around the screen using simple commands. I also learned to play games like Number Munchers, Word Munchers, and Odell Lake.

But the big one – and the most obvious for members of my generation – was Oregon Trail. I remember trying to figure out the best way to win the game and trying different iterations over several visits to the computer lab. The easiest path was to start as a banker who could buy nearly unlimited supplies and pay for services, but the challenge was to start with fewer resources and learn how to manage everything on the trek across the country.

I remember the sense of victory after finally rafting down the Columbia River and arriving in the Willamette Valley. Looking back, Oregon Trail was a simple game, but that moment was huge for a young kid.

About a month ago, the Gaming Historian published a deep-dive story about the origins and popularity of the game. Over 90 minutes, so many memories came flooding back as I learned all about this simple yet amazing game.

Check it out here or on YouTube, and don’t die of dysentery.

Culture on My Mind is inspired by the weekly Can’t Let It Go segment on the NPR Politics Podcast where each host brings one thing to the table that they just can’t stop thinking about.

For more creativity with a critical eye, visit Creative Criticality.

Timestamp #305: Flux – Once, Upon Time

May 15, 2024July 19, 2024 Michael Falkner5 Comments

A story that covers a lot of ground only to go full circle.

This chapter starts with a woman named Bel and her story in the aftermath of the Flux. On the run from Daleks, she’s trying to make sense of corruptions in time and space. As a swarm of blue particles consumes a pair of survivors she vows to find the one she loves.

Back at the Temple of Atropos, the Doctor tries to save Yaz and Vinder by pushing Dan on a pedestal as she leaps into the heart of the time storm. The others vanish as a Weeping Angel appears, then she’s swept away. A flashback follows to the Seige of Atropos where the four are commandos with the Doctor in charge.

Dan has his own vision where he gets coffee with Diane in Liverpool. Yaz has a similar vision where she’s on patrol with her police supervisor. Vinder has a vision where he receives an award and a promotion. All of them are aware of the irregularities in their scenarios as the Doctor flickers in and out.

The Doctor’s vision continues as her team infiltrates the Temple of Atropos in search of the Ravagers. She’s returned to the time storm where she stands before three giant Mouri. She’s returned to the temple where she discovers she’s reliving a moment from the Fugitive Doctor’s life. To save her friends, she needs to survive the encounter.

Dan ends up in tunnels where he encounters Joseph Williamson holding a laser weapon. After an encounter with the blue swarm, he returns to Liverpool where a vision of the Doctor tells him not to disappear while she tries to convince the Mouri to help.

Bel’s story continues after stealing a Lupari ship and flying to a new sector dominated by Cybermen. She consults a device called Tigmi before pushing onward.

Vinder’s memories continue as he serves the Grand Serpent. Yaz lives a memory of playing video games with Sonya, learns the truth of their predicament from the Doctor, and discovers that her timestream is being corrupted by the Weeping Angels.

At the Siege of Atropos, the Doctor faces the Ravagers (including Azure and an older version of Swarm). She learns about the Passengers – an endlessly large living prison with five of them holding hundreds of thousands of beings – and captures the Ravagers after they destroy two of the passengers. The Doctor reveals that one of the Passengers belongs to Division and contains the Mouri. The Doctor convinces the Mouri in the time storm to replicate the same infiltration.

Bel escapes from the planet but her ship is invaded by Cybermen. She narrowly survives by shooting all of them only to learn that all of the surviving villains are fighting for the scraps of the universe.

Vinder’s service to the Grand Serpent reveals that his commander is corrupt. When Vinder reports the Grand Serpent’s actions, he is exiled to Observation Outpost Rose. He is allowed to record only one message to his family.

The Doctor finishes her mission on Atropos, learning that one of her cohorts was Karvanista. She is swept to a station where she meets an old woman named Awsok who tells her that the Flux and Ravagers were introduced intentionally to destroy space and time. It was designed to stop the Doctor.

Yaz, Dan, Vinder, and the Doctor emerge in the modern-day temple as Mouri are restored. Swarm and Azure summon the blue Time Force particles and gloat that they have already won, taunting Dan with an image of Diane trapped in a Passenger. The villains teleport away and the team returns to the TARDIS, which Vinder easily recognizes.

Bel sits beside a campfire and listens to Vinder’s message. She promises to find Vinder and reunite him with his unborn child. Meanwhile, Vinder returns to his home planet and finds it ravaged by the Flux. He stays behind to search for Bel as the TARDIS moves on.

Peace on the TARDIS is shortlived, however, as a Weeping Angel appears on Yaz’s phone. It soon emerges and takes control of the ship.

The Angel has the TARDIS.

On the one hand, this story provides a ton of backstory for Vinder and the Doctor, particularly for the latter as a small slice of the Fugitive Doctor’s life is explained. It ties the Doctor to the temple and the Ravagers and provides a thread for the future about the Flux and its engineered impact on the universe. It also provides another plot thread as Bel searches for Vinder.

On the other hand, this chapter spins in a circle, ultimately going where Dan and Yaz went, which is nowhere. In fact, Dan and Yaz are effectively sidelined in safe pockets of time while the Doctor figures out a solution.

The story itself is the most chaotic of Flux so far, ping-ponging to and fro and ultimately resulting in a loss for our heroes. They didn’t achieve anything concerning saving the universe, though, to their credit, they did gain new information by following the path the enemy laid out.

It’s an interesting concept, but the execution felt frantic and anxious. Instead of ramping down at the end, it crashed to a halt with a cliffhanger. Thankfully, though, this intrusion into the TARDIS actually made sense since Yaz brought the Angel with her from the time storm.

Rating: 3/5 – “Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow.”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Flux – Village of the Angels

Timestamp #304: Flux – War of the Sontarans

May 8, 2024July 19, 2024 Michael Falkner3 Comments

It’s history, but not how you remember it.

Following last chapter’s cliffhanger, the Doctor gazes upon a giant, misshapen, dilapidated house as the Cloister Bell rings. She comes to on a battlefield with Yaz and Dan. The TARDIS stands nearby as the Doctor scans the surroundings, but the team is interrupted by a woman named Mary Seacole who accuses them of robbing the dead.

The Doctor deduces that they have been thrown back in time to the Crimean War, specifically Sevastopol in 1855. Unfortunately, the British aren’t fighting the Russians in this history. The enemy is an army of Sontarans, led by a commander on horseback.

We next catch up with Vinder, who has somehow landed inside a stone temple with a floating diamond-shaped entity called a Priest Triangle. The central chamber contains six plinths with humanoid holographic figures. The triangle explains that the Mouri must never be compromised.

The Doctor and her team arrive with Mrs. Seacole at the British Hotel, leading Yaz to wonder if history is being rewritten. Both Dan and Yaz vanish in a blue glow, the result of vortex energy combining with the Flux. The Doctor tries to enter the TARDIS, but the doors are not visible. Dan rematerializes outside the remains of his former home but finds that time has been rewritten due to the Sontaran invasion. He escapes an army of enforcers after his parents knock out the Sontarans with cookware.

Yaz materializes inside the temple where Vinder did, encountering Joseph Williamson from the year 1820. The temple floor plan keeps shifting and Williamson runs off, leaving Yaz to deal with a Priest Triangle. She agrees to help after reading the letters “WWTDD” on her hand.

The Doctor returns to the British Hotel and meets Lieutenant General Logan of the Light Division. They discuss the general’s battle plans, finding Sontar on a map where Russia and China should be. Since Seacole and Logan vaguely recognize the name Russia, the Doctor concludes that the temporal disruption must have been a recent event.

The Doctor accompanies Seacole on nursing rounds and finds a Sontaran foot soldier named Svild. The Sontaran was captured after being hit by a cannonball, and he asserts his right to silence under the Shadow Proclamation. That decision is quickly rescinded when he hears that the Doctor is nearby. She frees him under the promise that he will relay that information to his commander, allowing her to meet the commander on her signal.

The Doctor and Seacole follow Svild across the battlefield. They find the Sontaran camp under a camouflage shield and with it, a fleet of ships protected by hundreds of warriors. The Doctor asks Seacole to stand watch overnight while Svild relays his intel to Commander Skaak. The commander is impressed but executes Svild for his disgrace.

Back to the future, Dan hides with his parents and learns that the Sontarans arrived after the Three Minute Eclipse (the Lupari shield) and Dan’s subsequent disappearance. Eileen and Neville have learned how to kill Sontarans by hitting the port on their necks. They go to where the Sontarans first appeared, the Liverpool Docks, and Dan decides to scout ahead alone with his father’s wok. He eventually encounters Commander Ritskaw, a Sontarn who executes three innocent humans for spying, and learns of the Temporal Offensive. He then tries to find his way onto a Sontaran spaceship.

In the temple, Yaz meets Vinder. Together they learn that this is the Temple of Atropos on the planet Time. The Mouri, the people on the plinths, harness and control time in the universe. Two of them, however, are broken, and the triangle claims that time is evil and must be harnessed.

In Sevastopol, the Doctor uses her sonic screwdriver to signal for parlay. The Doctor and Skaak meet across the wide, empty battlefield, and the Doctor reveals herself. Skaak tells her they knew of the Flux and took advantage of the Lupari shield to slip onto the planet and embed themselves in a period of deep conflict. Skaak claims Linx first made a claim to Earth in the 13th century, and he chose the Crimean War because he wanted to ride a horse. General Logan ambushes the Doctor and apprehends her, leading to a human massacre.

The Doctor escapes by using Venusian aikido on her guard and meets with Seacole. With the Sontarans engaged on the battlefield, they decide to enter one of the ships. Due to the Temporal Offensive, the ships that Dan and the Doctor are invading are linked, so the two share what they’ve learned. The Sontarans are building ships to invade the entire history of humanity, using Crimea as a springboard. The call is interrupted by Ritskaw, leaving Dan to face off against a handful of Sontarans, but he is soon rescued by Karvanista.

Swarm and Azure visit the Temple of Atropos with a silent black-clad figure called a Passenger form. They promptly destroy a Priest Triangle with a touch. They encounter Yaz and Vinder and display their non-linear knowledge by revealing the WWTD marks – What would the Doctor do? – on Yaz’s hand. Azure and Swarm dodge Vinder’s gunfire and find the quantum-locked Mouri. Swarm kills one of them.

The Doctor and Seacole regroup at the British Hotel. General Logan arrives in distress, and the Doctor details an action plan. Since the Sontarans need to rest for 7.5 minutes every 27 hours, they will be vulnerable in approximately 38 minutes. The Doctor plans to drain the Sontaran supplies while they rest thus leaving them vulnerable to Earth’s atmosphere.

The Doctor faces off with Skaak while Dan and Karvanista destroy the Sontaran fleet and create a temporal explosion. Skaak orders his fleet to evacuate, but Logan gets revenge by destroying the Crimean fleet. The Doctor is furious with Logan but leaves him when the TARDIS calls. She arrives in Liverpool with a sopping-wet Dan and Karvanista, offering the human space on the TARDIS. The Lupari remains behind to protect Earth.

The TARDIS is in a bad state, and whatever is corrupting it hijacks the time capsule. The Doctor and Dan emerge in the Temple of Atropos where Azure leads them to the central chamber. Yaz and Vinder have replaced the two flickering Mouri, and Swarm and Azure count down before allowing the full force of time to blast through them.

This chapter does well by splitting up the heroes and making connections with the secondary characters. The Doctor and Dan get the lion’s share of the work in this episode, but Yaz gets shorted despite connecting with this miniseries’s main character in a major setting.

There are also plenty of mysteries to layer on, including the connection between the miniseries villains and the temple. The Sontarans make a great return here, including ties back to the classic era with both Linx and the same makeup style. It’s a wonderful love letter to the classic seasons.

Historically, this episode’s events could be the inspiration for Lord Alfred Tennyson’s Charge of the Light Brigade, which dramatizes an actual event in which the Light Brigade marches into certain death during the Crimean War. Notably, the Second Doctor had ties to the same conflict in The Evil of the Daleks and The War Games.

Logan’s revenge on the Sontarans reminds me of Harriet Jones and the retreating Sycorax (The Christmas Invasion) and the Brigadier’s destruction of the Sontarans (Doctor Who and the Silurians). The Doctor is rightfully angry about the murder of combatants who chose to disengage, and it’s good to see her acting the role as this era matures.

All told, I really enjoyed the story and the groundwork it continues to lay for the overall Flux storyline.

Rating: 4/5 – “Would you care for a jelly baby?”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Flux – Once, Upon Time

Timestamp #303: Flux – The Halloween Apocalypse

May 1, 2024July 19, 2024 Michael Falkner6 Comments

He’s not quite Dan’s best friend.

Of all the odd places, Yaz and the Doctor are trapped, upside down, dangling over an ocean of acid. As an alternative to the locks releasing their ankles in 79 seconds, a supernova is about to consume the planet. As an alternative to that, Karvanista’s kill disks will blast them into oblivion.

The death trap is reminiscent of something from Batman ’66.

After some shenanigans including voice-activated restraints and a well-placed mattress in the TARDIS, the Doctor and Yaz escape and set a course for Karvanista’s next target: Earth.

In Liverpool, 1820, Joseph Williamson digs a tunnel in preparation for the “cataclysmic”, reasoning that would supposedly drive anyone else mad. Two centuries later, Dan Lewis leads a tour group around the Museum of Liverpool. He’s not a real tour guide, however, and a museum employee named Diane escorts him out. Dan just wants to make people happy. The pair make plans for Halloween drinks later that night.

En route to Earth, the TARDIS refuses to land. The Doctor receives a psychic vision of two agents on a planetoid checking on a prisoner named Swarm. The prisoner has been contained in the Burnished Rage battleground since the dawn of the universe, but today is when he breaks free, restoring his vitality by consuming their life forces. The two women were apparently agents of the Division. When the vision ends, Yaz tells the Doctor about a black fluid leaking from the TARDIS. The Doctor scans it and sets their new course for October 31st.

Dan volunteers at the Jenning Street Food Bank, turning down a food box for himself. As he and Wilma lock up, a device scans them. Dan goes home and gives out candy for Halloween, though he refuses a man holding a carton of eggs. He later regrets not taking food from Wilma since his fridge and cupboard are bare, but his lament is short-lived as Karvanista breaks down his door and reveals his canine-like Lupar visage. Dan soon ends up in a cage.

The Doctor and Yaz follow Karvanista to Dan’s house and find evidence of a Lupari fleet waiting to invade Earth. They spring a trap and escape just as Dan’s house is miniaturized. Meanwhile, Dan wakes up in an electrified cage on Karvanista’s ship. Unfortunately for him, the hunter explains that he’s totally irrelevant.

Jumping to the Arctic, two researchers named Jón and Anna hear an alert from a glowing device in their garage. They seem to recognize it, but Anna smashes the device and ignores the warning.

In Liverpool, the Doctor investigates the house. Yaz and the Doctor meet a woman named Claire who claims to know them from the past. The Doctor rushes off at a signal from the Lupari, but the TARDIS seems to have some dimensional issues. Together, the Doctor and Yaz pilot the temperamental TARDIS to find the fleet. Yaz berates the Doctor for keeping secrets from her, but the argument is interrupted by a temporal field around Karvanista’s ship.

Claire returns to her house and finds a Weeping Angel. She seems to know something is coming for her, and the Angel eventually sends Claire back in time.

Next up, we visit Observation Station Rose in the depths of the universe. Observation Officer Inston-Vee Vinder makes (yet) another status report, finding the beauty of the universe a balm to his otherwise overwhelming boredom. He detects an error and watches as a dark cloud consumes Thoribus Minor.

Jón and Anna receive a visit from Swarm. Jón is consumed, but Anna is revealed as Swarm’s sister Azure.

The Doctor and Yaz land on Karvanista’s ship. The Doctor rushes off to confront Karvanista while Yaz seeks out Dan. It turns out that the invasion fleet is a recall fleet, bonded to humanity as guardians to rescue them in an ultimate crisis. Dan is the designated human to which Karvanista was bonded. Also, Karvanista is the only living Division operative left and the Doctor wants answers about her past. Instead, Karvanista tells the Doctor about the Flux.

The Flux, the ever-consuming cloud, bears down on Vinder’s station. With only a few minutes to survive, he launches an escape pod.

The Doctor, Yaz, and Dan escape from Karvanista’s ship on the TARDIS (which having more dimensional issues). They head to the edge of the solar system as, thirty trillion lightyears away, Sontaran Commander Ritskaw and Psychic Surveyor Kragar prepare to take advantage of the pending destruction. The Cloister Bell sounds as the Doctor receives another vision, this time of planets and entire civilizations being destroyed. She also sees Swarm on a desolate landscape, who reveals himself as her nemesis from the Doctor’s Division days.

The Flux changes direction and pursues the TARDIS, forcing the Doctor to set course for Earth. On the planet below, Azure lures Diane into a trap, but the planet is saved as the Lupari encase the Earth in a protective formation. Unfortunately, the TARDIS is unable to escape the Flux, even as the Doctor uses pure vortex energy as a weapon.

The Doctor stares down the end of the universe as the Flux rushes toward the TARDIS.

The vibe of this introduction is creepy and frantic. It does the job of setting up the game board and building tension as the Flux bears down on Earth, but the stakes are all too familiar in modern science fiction. How do you come back from demolishing the entire universe?

The relationship between Yaz and the Doctor has obviously strengthened since Graham and Ryan left the TARDIS. Yaz has learned to pilot the TARDIS (like Donna and Nardole before her, as well as several others in the audio universe) and has no problem calling the Doctor on her bluffs. It’s a welcome reprieve from being in the backseat for many of the previous adventures.

It’s definitely a good start and plays well into Chibnall’s strengths with long-form television. The only question that remains: What’s up with the well-placed mattress?

Rating: 4/5 – “Would you care for a jelly baby?”

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Flux – War of the Sontarans

Culture on My Mind – Dragon Con Report 2024 #4: Volunteers

April 26, 2024April 18, 2024 Michael FalknerLeave a comment

Culture on My Mind
Dragon Con Report 2024 #4: Volunteers
April 26, 2024

One of the ways that I like to prep for Dragon Con is by listening to the Dragon Con Report podcast. Brought to you by the ESO Network, the podcast is a monthly discussion on all things Dragon Con that counts down to the big event over Labor Day weekend in Atlanta, Georgia.

The show is hosted by Michael Gordon, Jennifer Schleusner, and Channing Sherman, and it delivers news, notes, tips, and tricks for newbies and veterans alike. The Dragon Con Newbies community has a great relationship with the show and the network.

The fourth show of the 2024 season explores what it’s like to be a volunteer at Dragon Con. The convention is run by volunteers, from registration to technology operations and more. Mike, Jen, and Channing talk with guests Julia McCure (a volunteer with Information Services) and Andrés Thomas (of the Animation Track) to discuss the lifeblood of the convention.

The show can be found in video form on YouTube and in audio on the official website and wherever fine podcasts are fed. The Dragon Con Report channels can be found on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. You can catch their shows live on those platforms or on demand on their website.

Culture on My Mind is inspired by the weekly Can’t Let It Go segment on the NPR Politics Podcast where each host brings one thing to the table that they just can’t stop thinking about.

For more creativity with a critical eye, visit Creative Criticality.

Timestamp: Series Twelve Summary

April 24, 2024July 22, 2024 Michael FalknerLeave a comment

Jodie Whittaker’s second set picked up the pace.

This group of stories was where the Thirteenth Doctor hit her stride, and it seemed a fitting place to throw a wrench in her confidence with the Timeless Child revelations. The only stinker in the bunch was Orphan 55, a story with one of the most telegraphed plot twists, a serious lack of tension and internal continuity, and an overly preachy ending that lectured the audience and characters instead of using subtle metaphorical elegance.

Much of this series focused on pulpy storytelling and having fun, though Chris Chibnall’s penchant for “oops, we’re out of time” rush endings was a constant companion. I love how this series remembered that Doctor Who can be exciting, whimsical, and thoughtful. The Timeless Child thread was woven fairly well throughout the series, and I appreciate how it only cropped up from time to time instead of being in our faces like Russell T. Davies and Steven Moffat are prone to do.

The TARDIS got some enhanced interior deco, finally adding some depth to that claustrophobic set, and the Master got a facelift with an amazing performance from Sacha Dawan. We also got to see the trio of Ryan, Graham, and Yaz in top form (although I would still love to see Yaz doing more) before the fam was broken apart. It was a fun series that, with one notable exception, I’d easily watch again.

Overall, Series Twelve comes in with a solid 4.1 score. That’s in good company with the classic Fifth Season, the classic Eighteenth Season, Series Two, Series Seven, and Series Nine. It’s a six-way tie for tenth place in the scope of the Timestamps Project.

Spyfall – 5
Orphan 55 – 2
Nikola Tesla’s Night of Terror – 4
Fugitive of the Judoon – 5
Praxeus – 4
Can You Hear Me? – 4
The Haunting of Villa Diodati – 4
Ascension of the Cybermen & The Timeless Children – 4
Revolution of the Daleks – 5

Series Eleven Average Rating: 4.1/5

Next up, the Timestamps Project continues to the end of the Thirteenth Doctor’s era with Flux and the finale specials.

UP NEXT – Doctor Who: Flux – The Halloween Apocalypse

Culture on My Mind – Theater & Nerddom: Is Theater Part of Pop Culture?

April 19, 2024April 11, 2024 Michael FalknerLeave a comment

Culture on My Mind
Theater & Nerddom: Is Theater Part of Pop Culture?
April 19, 2024

This week, I’m playing catch-up with the Theater and Musical Lovers YouTube Channel.

The channel and its associated Facebook group were established as an unofficial gathering of Dragon Con attendees who love theater, musicals, and the performing arts. Their goal is to create a community of fellow thespians and fans at the convention.

Last August, the thespians and stagehands discussed why theater and performing arts are definitely part of nerd and pop culture. Yes, indeed, they answered the question in the first act, but the discussion is really the main attraction. Join Gary, Sarah, Sue, Kelly, and Courtney to geek out on the big stage.

Note: Depending on security settings, you may have to click below to see the video directly on YouTube. You should definitely subscribe to their channel for more updates.

The Theater and Musical Lovers Group will be hosting more of these panels. If you’re interested in participating or have some topic ideas in mind, head over to the group on Facebook and drop them a line. You can also find them on Instagram and coming soon on TikTok.

You can find Gary and Sarah on the socials: On Twitter, they are Gary_Mitchel, SarahRose_KPK, and Daisuki_Suu; on Instagram, they are Gary_Mitchel and Daisuki_Suu; and Gary’s horror-themed podcast that he hosts with Erin McGourn is A Podcask of Amontillado. Of course, the Theater & Musical Lovers channel can be found on YouTube.

Culture on My Mind is inspired by the weekly Can’t Let It Go segment on the NPR Politics Podcast where each host brings one thing to the table that they just can’t stop thinking about.

For more creativity with a critical eye, visit Creative Criticality.

Timestamp #302: Revolution of the Daleks

April 17, 2024July 22, 2024 Michael Falkner5 Comments

A little bit of cloning and a little bit of open warfare.

It’s been 367 minutes since the Doctor and her team destroyed the Reconnaissance Dalek in GCHQ. An ill-fated truck driver takes the empty casing to Depository 23, but he is assassinated en route with some bad roadside tea. The woman who served the tea stashes his corpse in the truck and drives it away.

Jo Patterson, the Technology Secretary for the United Kingdom, meets with Leo Rugazzi and Jack Robertson to see the engineer’s new defense drones. The demonstration includes a mock riot which is broken up by a drone that looks like a Dalek but uses water cannons and tear gas. The drone is solar-powered and driven by artificial intelligence. Patterson buys into the idea because they will help her win the upcoming election.

Some 79 billion light years away, the Doctor wakes up in her asteroid cell and scratches another tally mark on the wall. She goes through her daily routine, including a walk with restrained Weeping Angels, Ood, Silence, and Pting, before getting ready for bed. She hears four knocks through her wall and knocks four times in reply, but there is no further answer.

Back on Earth, Ryan, Graham, and Yaz meet in the TARDIS disguised as a house. Yaz is working on a method to find the Doctor, but Ryan and Graham urge her to move on. Graham also shows her footage of the new security drone and the companions decide to investigate.

Patterson convinces Robertson to expedite a national rollout of the security drones at no cost to the taxpayers. Later, the companions confront Robertson about his drones but are forced to leave when armed security arrives.

In the prison, the Doctor finds Jack Harkness during her daily constitutional. He shows her a temporal-freezing gateway disinhibitor bubble which they use to escape by treating it like a hamster ball. Using a vortex manipulator, the pair vanishes.

Patterson wins her election as Prime Minister and party leader. Rugazzi shows Robertson the organic remnants he found in the original casing, which he has cloned and grown into a Dalek mutant. Robertson tells Leo to destroy it, but it eventually takes control of the engineer.

The vortex manipulator drops Jack and the Doctor inside the Doctor’s TARDIS. Jack likes the new interior design. They discuss the Cyberium and Ashad, as well as the Doctor’s imprisonment for being herself while she was trying to figure out who she was. She tells the TARDIS to find her fam.

That fam is discussing the Dalek threat when the TARDIS materializes in the living room. It’s been ten months since the companions and the Doctor were separated, and after she apologizes, the companions tell her about the Dalek.

The Dalek controlling Leo takes him to Osaka, Japan, where he finds a clone farm that has somehow sprung to life in the time since it was cloned. As the companions board the TARDIS, Jack gives them a crash course on his history with the Doctor. They split up, sending Yaz and Jack to find the Dalek DNA in Osaka while Ryan and Graham accompany the Doctor to Robertson’s office.

Robertson shows off his 3D printing operation, but the Doctor warns him he’s messing with something he doesn’t understand. He also denies having a facility in Osaka, which Yaz and Jack find listed as an agricultural park but containing the clone farm. Jack also warns Yaz that she should enjoy her journey with the Doctor because it will end, but is worth the pain in the end.

PM Patterson announces the defense drones in an address outside 10 Downing Street. While she promises a new secure age for the UK, the Doctor, Graham, and Ryan take Robertson to Osaka. The Doctor and Ryan have a heart-to-heart talk during which she promises to find out about herself. Meanwhile, Yaz and Jack set explosives and are besieged by the cloned Daleks. They get some relief when the TARDIS arrives.

The Doctor asks about the farm and Dalek-Leo admits that he infiltrated Earth’s networks and diverted resources to remotely direct its construction. He even fed his clones with the workers just to keep things clean. The Dalek intends to use the planet as a base to conquer this sector of the universe. Yaz and the Doctor note that the light is changing in the facility, gradually becoming ultraviolet to allow the clones to teleport into the shells that Robertson built.

With thousands of shells at their command, the Daleks begin their assault on Earth, including the assassination of PM Patterson. The Dalek controlling Leo kills the engineer and teleports away. The Doctor finally figures out who she is… she’s the one who stops the Daleks. Opting for the nuclear option, she sends the Reconnaissance Scout’s signal through the time vortex and summons the Death Squad Daleks – the SAS of Daleks – who will ignore humans in favor of exterminating the impure clones. They mustn’t realize, however, that the Doctor is on Earth.

As the cloned Daleks wreak havoc in the streets, the bronze-colored Death Squad begin exterminating Robertson’s army. As the Doctor prepares to move on, Robertson approaches the Death Squad and joins them with information about who sent the signal.

The Doctor continues her plan: Once all of the defense drones are destroyed, Jack will destroy the Death Squad ship. Graham and Ryan join him and start planting charges. Jack finds Robertson as the businessman tells the Dalek leader about the Doctor. As the final defense drone is destroyed, Jack calls the Doctor with what he learned and she enacts a backup plan with Yaz.

The Daleks detect the TARDIS hovering over the city and swarm around it. She emerges and baits them into entering the TARDIS as the explosives tear the command ship apart. The Doctor appears as a hologram and reveals that the Daleks are trapped in the “house” TARDIS. Further, she has programmed it to fold in on itself and emerge in the heart of the Void where it will self-destruct.

With the threat eliminated, Graham and Ryan watch the news as Robertson takes credit for saving everyone. Disgusted, the pair joins the Doctor and Yaz on the TARDIS where Jack sends regards from Gwen Cooper. It is then that Ryan declares that he’s done traveling with her because he knows what he wants to do with his life.

The Doctor hugs him farewell. Yaz wants to keep traveling, but Graham doesn’t want to miss his grandson growing up. The fam shares one last hug and the Doctor gives each of the men a piece of psychic paper. The Doctor and Yaz are sad, but they know that it’s okay.

Sometime later, Graham and Ryan are back on the hillside as the latter practices with a bicycle. They discuss strange occurrences like a troll invasion in Finland and gravel creatures in Korea. They decide to make plans, but first, they finish cycling practice.

And a vision of Grace watches over them as they work.

The companions really steal this show as the Doctor struggles with the Timeless Child revelation. It makes sense, given that this is the swan song for Ryan and Graham. We also get a good story where three companions seem to work well together. Unfortunately, that formula still doesn’t include Yaz as she gets very little to do with this otherwise explosive plot.

There are some hiccups along the way. No one addresses the murder that kicks off the defense drone program, and the timing’s a bit suspect when it comes to building the farm. The Dalek wasn’t in charge of Leo long enough to make that work, but the story needed a way to mass-produce Daleks.

On the plus side, the subtle references to Doctor Who history are pretty clever. The Death Squad Daleks are the bronze versions that have popped up throughout the revival era, and the defense drones are voiced similarly to the Imperial Daleks last seen during the Dalek Civil War. It makes sense that they would fight one another.

I enjoyed the crash course on Jack’s history with the new companions. It plays well with the running thread of the companions and their questions about traveling in the TARDIS. I also dug the running gag of not telling Robertson how the TARDIS works while he traveled in it.

Finally, I’m glad that the creative team is embracing the changes they made by way of the Timeless Child. The Doctor has to rediscover who they are while facing a large, looming threat. It’s good drama.

Note that this is the final appearance of Captain Jack Harkness (as of early 2024) due to allegations of sexual misconduct leading to John Barrowman’s blacklisting by the BBC.

Rating: 5/5 – “Fantastic!”

UP NEXT – Series Twelve Summary

Culture on My Mind – Dragon Con Report 2024 #3: Photo Shoots

April 12, 2024April 11, 2024 Michael FalknerLeave a comment

Culture on My Mind
Dragon Con Report 2024 #3: Photo Shoots
April 12, 2024

The third show of the 2024 season talks about the vibrant community of photo shoots at the convention. Mike, Jen, and Channing talk with guests Bill Watters and Danique Cosplay to discuss everything you wanted to know (and some things you didn’t) about the intersection of cosplay and professional photography.

Culture on My Mind is inspired by the weekly Can’t Let It Go segment on the NPR Politics Podcast where each host brings one thing to the table that they just can’t stop thinking about.

For more creativity with a critical eye, visit Creative Criticality.

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